What happens when a prank crosses the line?
A good prank played on a colleague or friend may involve a brief moment of embarrassment to be humorously recalled by those involved in future years.
Good pranks never result in suicide.
Tyler Clementi was a victim of a prank that deviated from playful to malicious.
His last words to the world were through his Facebook page — “Jumping off the gw bridge sorry.”
An 18-year-old freshman at Rutgers University, Clementi asked his roommate if he could have the room until midnight on Sept. 19.
Clementi’s roommate, Dharun Ravi, agreed and went into Molly Wei’s room, where he accessed his webcam via Wei’s computer and spied on Clementi.
Not only did Ravi witness his roommate engaging in sexual activity with someone, but he also streamed it live on the Internet for all to see.
After finding out what had occurred, three days later, on Sept. 22, Clementi jumped from the George Washington Bridge, killing himself.
Ravi and Wei have been charged with invasion of privacy, which is punishable by up to five years in prison. However, this is not the topic of concern.
The controversy lies in whether the two students will receive hate crime charges (which are much more severe), as Clementi was taped while involved with another man.
On one end, people are arguing the two students performed a simple prank, and it had nothing to do with Clementi’s perceived sexual orientation.
On the night of the original recording, Ravi went to his Twitter and exclaimed that he saw his roommate “making out with a dude.”
Ravi, however, said the initial broadcast was an accident — he just happened to dial his own computer from Wei’s computer, and he just happened to catch his roommate involved with another man. I do not believe this — I think Ravi was curious about what his roommate was doing. It appears he violated his roommate’s privacy to satisfy his own selfish curiosity.
Was this motivated by the fact Clementi was involved with another man? If yes, then hate crime charges should be filed.
If Clementi were involved with a woman, I do not think the motivation to stream the interaction over the Internet and make it public knowledge would be there — there would not be as large of a following. It was reported by some students at Rutgers that it quickly became the topic of gossip around the dormitory Clementi and Ravi were living in. I do not think that would be the case if Clementi was with a woman.
I feel Ravi was motivated to attempt to catch him in the act two more times because Clementi was perceived to be gay. On Sept. 21, the day before Clementi committed suicide, Ravi took to his Twitter to say, “I dare you to video chat me. ... Yes, it’s happening again.”
On the other end of the spectrum, people are equating the actions of Ravi and Wei to manslaughter, saying the two students’ actions unmistakably, although unintentionally, led to Clementi’s suicide.
A version of this article appeared in the Oct 5 issue of the Collegiate Times.
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great article, well written
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I think everyone should be treated as they would want others to treat them and we should all be treated fairly in the justice system. With that said, why would the perpetrator of this crime receive more punishment for violating Tyler's privacy than for violating my privacy for watching me with my girlfriend? As far as I can tell the same standard should be applied. This goes for cases of assault, and all the other possible ways that a perpetrator might violate. Why would a male get more time for beating up a gay male than for beating up another straight male? Lets say both victims end up in the hospital with the same injuries and medical bills. Why is one victim "more important" than another?
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It's not at all that one victim is more important than another, it's that the crime is different. There are examples of aggravating factors all over criminal law: elderly, children, police, etc. Note that we're also concerned with the defendant's state of mind (e.g. first degree murder, second degree, manslaughter, etc.).
Would you say someone who beats a child should be punished differently from someone who gets in a bar fight?
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As far as I am concerned there should be no difference in the case that I described. If there is an unprovoked attack by a straight male against a gay male or another straight male (both victims lets say are the same age), then to me there is no difference. If the attacker beats me up just because he doesn't like my face vs beating up a gay male because he hates gay people there shouldn't be a difference. We are both equally hurt/victimized. There should not be different classes of victims based on gender, sexual orientation, or race.
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And yet you ignore the question.
Would you say someone who beats a child should be punished differently from someone who gets in a bar fight?
Alternately, since you mentioned gender: should a 300 lb professional fighter who beats a 90 lb woman be punished the same as a guy who gets in a bar fight on Friday night with a man of similar build?
(hint: sentencing laws recognize all of these differences -- the criminal justice system isn't a computer)
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I believe his point was that in a situation where the only dividing factor is race, gender, or orientation, there shouldn't be a difference.
If a 220lb man beats a child, of course he should be punished more then a guy in a bar fight, but if a 220lb man beats a 150lb STRAIGHT man, he should be puniched the same for beating another 150lb. GAY man.
The hate crime ordeal is in itself prejudiced against people who don't fall into a certain catagory.
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Similarly, why should someone who commits murder be treated any differently than someone who commits manslaughter? The end result is the same - is it not? Why is one victim "more important" than another?
In this specific case I don't think hate had anything to do with it. In a society where gays are more open and more visible it can't be surprising that a prank such as this one might actually be no more hateful than if the same prank were pulled and Clementi were with a girl.
Could sexual orientation have been an influence in Ravi's stupid idea to pull this prank? Yeah, probably - it's far more interesting to watch two guys kiss. Hate crimes require hate, though. I don't think there was any hate in this situation.
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To address this issue simply, while the LGBTQI community is glad to have supportive allies who see our private lives as no less normal or threatening than the private lives of heterosexual people, the problem is that being a sexual minority makes one vulnerable to discrimination. Minor offenses occur daily (sometimes without the offender even realizing that they have done something hurtful), but when reputation or health (physical attacks, etc) are compromised solely based on perceived sexual orientation, we're dealing with a hate crime.
Hate is a loaded word. I'd wager that most people have only truly felt the full emotion of hate a few times in their lives; we take this word seriously and imbue the emotion with weighty connotations. Hate is also the root of fear, and what drives the inability to accept something that differs from the norms with which you feel safe. This is why discriminatory crimes are hate crimes.
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The case of Tyler Clementi may be difficult for some heterosexual people to understand. It is a rational human thought to imagine oneself and an opposite-sex partner in the same situation... eventually the boyfriend-girlfriend pair would get over the embarrassment associated with strangers seeing their naked bodies performing intimate acts, as it could easily be assumed that the couple was NOT in an asexual relationship.
For us in the Queer Community though, "coming out" is an important process - harrowing, really - where we reveal ourselves as second class citizens and become open targets for non-allies. Many of us have unknowingly told the wrong people, and we have learnt what it is like to have even close friends and family come to hate us for who we are. Heterosexual individuals have a luxury in this society because you are "straight until proven otherwise," and you have all the rights due to American citizens.
Tyler lost the chance to come out on his own terms to people with whom he felt safe. His reputation was sullied, and the inconsiderate natures of his peers robbed from him the right to keep his sexuality a private matter.
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You're taking the situation out of context. What happens when one person is hurt? The person who hurt them gets punished.
What happens when one person gets hurt because of a prank? The person who pulled the prank gets punished.
What happens when someone gets pranked, because of their sexual orientation, gets hurt? The person who pranked them gets punished because they committed a hate crime. It is in fact a hate crime because they targeted someone for a minority-quality.
You can see where I am going with this.
As I mentioned in my comment addressing this and other comments, once sexual orientation is a blind factor to society, the law can consider treating cases like what you mentioned in the same way. Since it is not an accepted factor, it's treated differently.
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05 hokie: youre right...i should get a tougher punishment for violating the privacy of a gay man vs a straight one. The reason is simple: race, gender, sex, age, and sexual preference matter.
HOWEVER, it will be hard to prove that the pranksters in this case targeted this person because he was gay. They sure violated this persons privacy but to say that it was solely done because of his sexual preference, well that's just hard to prove.
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Very well written, very proud of you, Mr. Trebach
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I on the other hand cannot stand the one sided speculation of this article as well as other articles printed in the Collegiate Times. As I moved to the second page, I was hoping to be presented with the opposite side of the argument, but was instead faced with more speculation of "hate" and malice. Good articles and papers look at both sides of the issue and then give a small amount of writer issued speculation, leaving the reader to form his/her own decision. Please, Collegiate times, inform us. Then, allow our sophisticated minds make the decision.
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Maybe your sophisticated mind missed this, but this is a column. Newspaper columns are opinion pieces.
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I'm going to assume that you are straight and have never had to deal with being singled out for anything in your life. Would I be wrong in guessing that you are also a white male?
If you had a "sophisticated mind" you would understand that sexual orientation is never salient when people are straight. Sexual orientation for a homosexual, however, is ALWAYS salient. People think of you as their gay hall-mate rather than just their hall-mate. You're never someone's friend, you're their gay friend. I read half of the first page and knew that this kid had probably been called a fag at least once daily since he moved into his dorm. This situation would never have happened if Tyler were straight.
Hate crime. No question.
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While I agree with most of what you said, 5th, it's amazing to me the way you just generalized white males, which is pretty standard, and no one reacts. It's just normal to insinuate that white males are never the recipient of bias and are actually the ones perpetuating it, yet while making those comments, showing the opposite. White men are discriminated against as much as anyone, it's just not considered discimination in our current and even celebrated by much of the media.
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So 5th you want MORE special treatment for the victim? Why not treat him as if he hadn't been gay and prosecute the crime as it stands - a callused invasion of privacy. Calling it a hate crime only singles out the victim more and again treats him as a separate and different class of people. After all you wouldn't call it a hate crime if he'd been straight and the MSM probably wouldn't have picked up the story at all in the first place.
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To those questioning: It is different because it would not have been as big of a deal to everyone else if Clementi was with a woman.
Manslaughter and murder are different because of intentions.
It is treated differently because accidents happen, no matter how tagic. If every account of manslaughter were treated as murder, then innocent people would be in jail. What about a car accident where every person involved were sober and nothing was done wrong by either party? What if someone gets killed on a construction site because of an accident? The person who lives should not be condemned with murder because of an accident. Clementi's room mate's actions accidentally led to his suicide. He intentionally humiliated him, however, which is in fact a hate crime AND invasion of privacy.
On the idea that Clementi's case should be treated the same as an invasion of a straight-male's privacy (only)... I personally believe that it is in fact different because if the public treats minorities different, which is usually in negative way, then the laws should be made to fit around this. If you want to change that, then social equality is the first step. If everyone wouldn't have made such a big deal about Clementi having sexual relations with another man, then he might still be alive today. Even more so if his room mate decided to not treat a different sexual orientation as an alien subject for all to gawk at.
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Hate crimes are racist, yes I said it.
A white male beats a black man within an inch of his life because he hates black people: Hate Crime, Assault - 15 Years in prison.
A black male beats a white man within an inch of his life because he hates white people: Assault - 5 years in prison.
Sounds racist to me...I could go on with the others too, Hate Crimes are also sexist and orientationist (Dunno the term for it). Why does beating a black/gay man yield longer prison terms then beating white men? If you tell me that it is because hate never drives a crime against straight whites then you are a liar and poorly misinformed.
You want equality, then be equal. You want special treatment because you are a minority, don't cry to me for sympathy when people continue to hate on your opinion.
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I don't want special treatment. I want to be an American, enjoy a long married life with my soulmate, and not have anyone tell me that the way I am living is wrong.
I'd even wager that we agree on the inequalities in the penal system. Straight white men targeted by hate crimes should have the same protection as a lesbian woman from an ethnic minority.
I do want equality. And there's nothing I'd love better than to see myself and my community receive equal treatment. Nothing more, nothing less.
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Glad we agree on the point, I hope that we as a nation continue to step towards that.
Please don't misconstrue my comment to mean that these problems against minorities, particualrly the Gay/Lesbian minority, don't exist. All I am after is for people on the "We need hate-crime laws" side to realize that this is a step in the wrong direction, unless of course even white males can be protected under these laws, which currently they are not, in practice not in theory.
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Read what I said.
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I did read your comment, and you are obviously bias against straight people.
Who are you to say he wouldn't have been humiliated if it was with a woman? Do you know him? Did you ask him and he replied that it was solely because he wa gay?
By stating that the laws should suit only minorities needs is like putting out a fire with a flamethrower...
These kids deserve to get something, jailtime etc. but they should get no more or less time just because the kid was gay.
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Scarlet, then shouldn't gays and lesbians have equal rights under the law? Why is the Government involved with a marriage? Why does the Government give tax breaks to married couples, and not equal treatment to same-sex couples (maybe call it civil unions, but you actually lose money if you have a gay partner)? Isn't that discrimination? I am a white, heterosexual male, yet I believe blacks and gays/lesbians receive unequal treatment by society. I feel like a white, heterosexual male, that I have a lot more opportunities in life and people will treat me nicer when they first meet me...just by knowing those facts. Is that fair?
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Black President your point is invalid
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What a racist thing to say. He's just as much white as black. What is this - the 1800s? As little as 1/16th black blood and a person was counted as fully black and a slave. Pretty racist to say that a man's 50% white background matters for nothing and he's only to be known as the first black president.
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Hmmm how about the prank of swerving your car while your blindfolded passengers go through sophomore cadet initiation weekend?
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